Baz makes Leo so pretty

Leonardo DiCaprio was never so pretty as he was for Baz Luhrmann in Romeo + Juliet. As Dean wrote last week when he eulogised Leo’s sexiness -- click here for a refresher -- that’s the Leo we keep clinging to, the one we see with our memories instead of having to look at him as he is in the real, now.

Can Baz make Leo pretty again?

Well, he’s trying. And while it’s not quite the same -- because not even a movie director can reverse 15 years - Leo does look better for Baz than he has in a long time, and certainly better than he does for Scorsese although that’s probably not as much of a priority for Scorsese. It was Baz though who went through Australia meticulously to try and digitise some emotion in Nicole Kidman’s face. Baz knows about the aesthetic.

Here’s the second trailer for The Great Gatsby which was supposed to be released now but ended up getting pushed back to the summer to avoid struggling for space at the box office with all the others. I was rather medium on the first preview -- click here to revisit that article -- and while this one is definitely an improvement, I dunno, they had, like, 6 months to cut a new clip and they couldn’t find a new song? Oh Lainey you’re such a nitpicky f-cking c-nt.

I am. But most directors, and a director like Baz Luhrmann, he’s a nitpicky f-cking c-nt too and the fact that he approved this as the second -- and more widely viewed so therefore more important -- trailer to his passion project says everything about the tone he’s trying to set with his vision...in 3D. Which, at the beginning, seems to be New Year’s Eve in Vegas, and then emo wailing later on. Then again, I guess that’s why you adapt a book like Gatsby -- its thematic relevance extends beyond its era, and a director’s responsibility is to relate that to a new audience. What I’m bumping up against here then is how he’s selling it. Where’s the imagination? Give the Jersey Shore generation one version but somewhere in the film there has to be a different flavour, right? I wonder if, for the third trailer, he can cut a clip that’s a little less derivative.

“That’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” Indeed. But is Baz Luhrmann that subversive?